About that NH State House gun ban

I agree with where you're coming from with gaming revenue not being a budget solution. However, why should the state ban gambling? Shouldn't I be free to spend my money on gaming if I want to?

Exactly! Just like other things, the state needn't participate, only refuse to ban participation. This applies to gambling, abortion, pot smoking, tobacco smoking, etcetera. It should be up to the individual to choose what he wants.
 
Really? You pay very little to the state? I'd bet at the very least 15-20% of your property tax goes to the county/state, not to mention the many 'hidden' state taxes you pay in meals, gas, etc.

Let me paraphrase you: "I pay too much for our local schools. But I don't want to have less funding for my local schools. Therefore, someone else should pay for my local schools." Yet you in your own town vote on those taxes - your town comes up with the school budget and you and your neighbors vote on it. Many towns cut spending the last two years. My taxes were essentially flat the last three, and in fact a little lower the last two years - even though the state part went up (grr) - because my town voted down a lot of stuff we decided we could do without, or could be put off until times were better.

But gambling, especially casino gambling, requires creating more state apparatus. I'm not in favor of making a bigger state for some notion that it will make us locally have to pay less down the road, because it just won't do that. "This time for sure!" Yeah, right. Gambling revenue is highly variable, and so you can't reliably fund essential state government (or schools) with it, and if it is used to create rainy day funds... well, we all know how long rainy day funds last. Our state can't even manage steady-state funding from property taxes. Control spending first, or it'll be the same with any new revenue source. Ultimately, every state that has implemented casino gambling winds up in the same hole. Ultimately they all raid any surplus in the set-aside education revenue, then continue to bill against it even when that "source" is net in the red. I wonder why that is.

Reduce government waste. Eliminate the functions of state government that have little to do with its essential functions. Then talk about what you're funding and whether you're getting your money's worth.

Well said, and rep points for working in a Rocky and Bullwinkle reference.
 
Wish List

Yeah, it was looking dicey there for a while, but the people finally woke up and we've now kicked that myth in the teeth, torn it to shreds, burned the shreds and buried the ashes.

Since this turned into a NH wish list; I would like to see these 2 bills come back, come to a vote and pass this time around:

A RESOLUTION affirming States’ rights based on Jeffersonian principles.
http://www.gencourt.state.nh.us/legislation/2009/HCR0006.html

AN ACT relative to the exemption of certain firearms, firearms accessories, and ammunition made in New Hampshire from federal law and regulation.
http://www.gencourt.state.nh.us/legislation/2010/HB1285.html

Thanks!
 
Since this turned into a NH wish list; I would like to see these 2 bills come back, come to a vote and pass this time around:

A RESOLUTION affirming States’ rights based on Jeffersonian principles.
http://www.gencourt.state.nh.us/legislation/2009/HCR0006.html

AN ACT relative to the exemption of certain firearms, firearms accessories, and ammunition made in New Hampshire from federal law and regulation.
http://www.gencourt.state.nh.us/legislation/2010/HB1285.html
I hope we don't waste time on the second one. The first is a good shot across the bow of the fed, asserting the fed's limited power and the Constitution's reservation of other powers to the people and states. But the second one's wording and content make it utterly meaningless here. We can assert all we want that (say) a Sig isn't going to be subject to federal law, but last I checked we aren't even making them from NH steel, let alone all the other parts. That is, the first one sets the groundwork to change the fed. The second is a fantasy today, is meaningless on its face, and wouldn't even be required (if it had any legal effect) if the promise of the first resolution comes to fruition. Let's stick to the issues that will actually make a difference rather than burning legislative time and political capital on histrionics.
 
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